


The Visit to St Agnes

by Persiflage



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Daisy Playing Santa, Director Daisy Johnson, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, First Kiss, Future Fic, Gift Giving, POV Skye | Daisy Johnson, Tumblr Prompt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-03
Updated: 2017-12-03
Packaged: 2019-02-09 23:36:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,018
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12899280
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Persiflage/pseuds/Persiflage
Summary: Daisy plays Santa to the orphans of St Agnes.





	The Visit to St Agnes

**Author's Note:**

  * For [zauberer_sirin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/zauberer_sirin/gifts).



> Written for a Christmas/Winter Holiday prompt from Tumblr for the prompt _one lending the other their coat/scarf/hat to keep them warm_.

“Are you sure you’re gonna be warm enough?”

Coulson’s quiet query makes Daisy smile a bit – it’s typical of him to be worrying about her in any and all situations – but he always does it in such a low-key way that she knows it’s genuine concern for her well-being.

“I may have to talk to the science nerds about making me a thermal Quake suit,” she tells him, smirking to let him know she’s teasing.

“You should,” he agrees immediately, and she laughs softly, then bumps his shoulder with hers as they walk the remainder of the block from where they’d parked. She wishes they could’ve brought Lola, but bringing an SUV made more sense since it has more space to hold the gifts they’ve brought with them for the orphans at St Agnes. Only Sister McKenna is still there now, of all the nuns who knew her back when she was Mary Sue Poots, the troublesome child who was always being sent back to the orphanage. Everyone else has either passed away or moved on to other institutions.

Properly speaking, Sister McKenna is the Mother Superior now, but Daisy’s not sure she’ll remember to call her that, although she’ll try. When Daisy contacted her a few weeks ago to ask if she and a friend could bring gifts for the orphans, the older woman had sounded overjoyed to hear from her former charge, and Daisy had been relieved to hear that the nun sounded hale and hearty. 

“Here.” Coulson’s holding out his scarf to her, and she raises an eyebrow then looks down at her Quake fieldsuit. 

“Yeah, I don’t think that really works, Phil,” she tells him with a grin. “But I appreciate the gesture.” He looks a little crestfallen, and she feels a tiny pang of guilt for turning down his offer. “I’ll borrow it on the walk back, if that’s okay?”

“Of course.” 

She nods towards the tall building they’re approaching. “This is us.” 

He waits beside her when she stops to take a moment to gather her thoughts before they walk up the steps. “Just remember, Daisy, you’re not that little orphan girl any more. You’re the Director of SHIELD, a bona-fide superhero, and you have a place where you belong.”

She looks at him, marvelling at his ability to know what she’s thinking. “You’re something else, Phil, you know that?”

He gives her a puzzled look. “Did I say something wrong?” 

She shakes her head, then leans in and presses her lips lightly to his cheek. “Quite the opposite,” she assures him, then leads the way up the steps to the orphanage’s door. 

He’s looking even more puzzled now, which she supposes isn’t that surprising given that she just kissed him, even if it was only a brief peck on the cheek, but before he can ask for an explanation of her weird behaviour the door opens, and there is the Mother Superior smiling in obvious and genuine welcome at her.

“Daisy,” she says, and repeats Daisy’s gesture from a moment ago, briefly pressing a kiss to Daisy’s cheek. “Welcome back to St Agnes.”

“Hello Mother McKenna. This is my friend and colleague, Phil Coulson.”

“Welcome to St Agnes, Mr Coulson.” She reaches for one of the bags that Coulson’s toting, and insists on carrying it inside despite Coulson’s typically charming insistence that he can manage quite easily.

“I thought we could have a cup of coffee in my office before you go and speak to the children,” the Mother Superior tells them as she leads the way through the surprisingly quiet building. “Warm you up a bit since it’s so cold out.”

“Thank you,” Daisy says, then can’t help asking, “Where is everyone?”

The nun chuckles. “They’re in the Rec Room watching a movie at this moment.” Catching Daisy’s surprised look, she chuckles again. “A lot’s changed in the 30 years since you were first here,” she explains. “We’re a lot less restrictive with the children, and punishments are rarely punitive. We certainly don’t punish disobedience by depriving them of food or by isolating them anymore.”

“I’m glad,” Daisy tells her, and she is very pleased. She’d had to endure both those punishments as a child over what she’s since realised were very minor infractions. 

“I’m only sorry for every child who had to suffer those punishments in years past.“

“Yeah,” she says a little heavily. 

A moment later she feels Coulson’s hand press lightly against the small of her back, and when she glances sideways at him, he gives her an encouraging smile. She smiles back, thinking yet again how lucky she is to know him and to have his support in everything she does.

They have coffee – and mince pies, to Daisy’s delight – in Mother McKenna’s office, and chat about the gifts Daisy and Coulson have brought – they’re mostly books, but there are a handful of other things as well as Daisy had asked the nun to give her a list of individual items for each child so that she could personalise the gifts she gave: she understood how important it was that each child should feel like an individual, rather than just one of a group of orphans. 

“Do you want me to introduce you?” asks Mother McKenna as they head along the hallway to the Rec Room.

Daisy shakes her head. “No, thank you. I’ll say a few words of introduction. This isn’t about me, it’s about them. That’s why I asked you not to warn anyone I was coming. It’s not intended as a PR stunt.”

The Mother Superior nods, then opens the door ahead of them, and leads them into a room of about 20 children aged from 4 to 15. The children ignore her as most of them are focused on watching _Moana_ , although she notices a couple of the older ones are sitting quietly in a corner reading graphic novels and listening to music.

The two nuns who are supervising both look around when Mother McKenna enters the room, but the Mother Superior gestures to let them know they don’t need to get up.

The end credits begin, and Daisy half expects the children to start getting up and moving about, or at least to get antsy, but instead they remain watching, spellbound almost. But as she tunes into the song and listens to it, she can’t say she blames them – the song seems to speak to her:

See the light as it shines on the sea? It's blinding  
But no one knows, how deep it goes  
And it seems like it's calling out to me, so come find me  
And let me know.  
What's beyond that line, will I cross that line?  
See the line where the sky meets the sea? It calls me  
And no one knows, how far it goes  
If the wind in my sail on the sea stays behind me  
One day I'll know  
How far I'll go.

Once the final notes are dying away, the children stir into life, and Mother McKenna speaks before any noise can build, “Children, we have visitors.”

Daisy walks to the front of the Rec Room, Coulson close behind. She immediately hears mutters and whispers of “That’s Quake”, “Quake’s here”, “Is that really Quake?”, and she smiles at them.

“Hi guys,” she says. “I can tell some of you have already recognised me, so yes, I am Quake. But before I was Quake, I was also an orphan of St Agnes.” That silences every whisper, and she notices from the corner of her eye, that the two teens have taken off their headphones to listen too. 

“I was brought here when I was a year old. Something bad happened to my mom, and my dad had to look for her, so he couldn’t look after me, which is how I ended up here. I stayed until I was 16, but it wasn’t until a few years ago that I finally found my parents again. That probably sounds unbelievable to you, but that’s okay. I’m telling you this because I want you to know that you should never give up hope of finding a place where you can belong. It might not be with your mom and dad – perhaps they’re dead, or perhaps they can’t take care of you any more – but you will find someone somewhere who’ll make you feel that you belong.”

The silence in the room is deafening, but focused, and Daisy swallows before she continues. “I’m not just talking about marriage, either. There’s a phrase, ‘found family’ – it means that the family you belong to doesn’t have to be the family you’re born into. Sometimes you find another family – people who will love you no matter what you do, or how much you screw up. People who’ll be there for you and have your back in every circumstance. I know because I have a found family, as well as my birth family.”

She gives them a smile, feeling shaky inside. “What I’m saying is, ‘Don’t give up’, okay? You never know what’s around the corner.” She feels Coulson’s hand press against her back again. “And now, enough preachy stuff, we come bearing gifts. When I call out your name, please come and get your present.”

“Everyone?” someone asks from out of the group.

“Everyone,” Daisy says firmly. There’s a collective gasp from them and she bites her lip to hold back her emotions. Then she slips a hand into the bag she carries, and calls out the first name.

DJ-PC-DJ-PC-DJ

“Are you okay?” Coulson asks as they start along the sidewalk, heading back to the SUV.

“Yeah,” she says, then seeing his concerned expression. “Honestly, Phil, I’m fine. A bit overwhelmed, maybe, but I’m okay.”

He moves closer to her, then offers her his scarf, and she chuckles weakly, then accepts it, wrapping it firmly around her neck. “Thanks.”

He waves away her thanks. “You did a good thing today. You made each of those children feel special and wanted, and you gave them hope for the future.”

She shakes her head, and he wraps his arm around her shoulders. “I’m serious,” he says firmly. “You’ve made their Christmas.” She’s not expecting it when he leans in and kisses her cheek, and when she turns her head to speak, he presses his lips, ever so slowly and carefully, against hers.

“Phil,” she murmurs, then opens her mouth and lets him kiss her properly. The second kiss is as careful as the first was, but rather more passionate, and the heat from it fills Daisy’s body until she feels as if he’s set her very nerve-endings on fire.

“We need to stop,” she tells him softly, pulling back a little. She lifts her hand and places it over his heart. “As good as this is, we ought not to be making out in the middle of the street. It only needs one passer-by with a camera phone and a social media account, and we’ll be all over Twitter and the rest like a rash.”

“I understand,” he says, “you have to preserve your media image.”

She snorts rudely at his words. “No, Phil, I want to protect the privacy of St Agnes. It wouldn’t take long for some enterprising sort to discover that’s where I’ve been this morning, and the media would be all over the orphanage like a rash, wanting exclusives from the children and the staff, and I won’t do that to them.”

He nods. “Of course.” He lifts his hand and curls his fingers around her wrist, then gently lowers her hand away from his chest. “I wasn’t thinking, sorry.”

“It’s okay. We’ll just have to save it for when we have some privacy. Then you can make out with me as much as you like.”

He smirks. “Promise?”

She draws a cross with her index finger over her heart. “Promise.”

“Deal then,” he says, and sets off to where they parked at a rather faster pace, which makes her smirk – after all these years, she’s also a little excited to explore this aspect of their relationship.


End file.
